


if you grow tired of my love, what will we do?

by jonphaedrus



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, Family Bonding, Gen, vader tries oh my god how he tries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-14
Updated: 2015-08-14
Packaged: 2018-04-14 15:26:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4569579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonphaedrus/pseuds/jonphaedrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They are very much alike.</p><p>He is not sure what he thinks of this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	if you grow tired of my love, what will we do?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Harpalyce](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harpalyce/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Masquerade](https://archiveofourown.org/works/948249) by [Harpalyce](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harpalyce/pseuds/Harpalyce). 



> "write your kingsman bb" my brain says "but masquerade fanfic" my heart says
> 
> and here i am

They are very much alike.

He is not sure what he thinks of this.

 

 

Oh, she reminds him of Padmé, of course. She has her mother’s thick, dark waving hair, and her eyes that look soft as fresh-tilled soil at first glance, but once you look closer, are as hard as plate-steel. She has her mother’s square jaw and red lips, the same high, arched brows and small stature.

She has her mother’s flair for the political: her understanding of the complex relationships that form between factions, her ability to play people off of each other. She could twist anyone around to her way of thinking—and she did, in the Senate. She still does. 

On the other hand, she’s so much like him. She has his nose, and his cheekbones, and his eyes. She has his broad shoulders, and his same fiery, unstoppable temper that alternates with great bouts of depression. She blames herself for everyone’s failures, and—like him—she solves most of her problems-head on.

They even yell at people the same.

He’s heard the rumours that more and more Rebels are figuring it out, because something will go wrong and father and daughter will show up at the same time and yell in identical counterpoint, and, frankly, he’s a little bit uncomfortable, knowing of all things  _that’s_ genetic. 

Her smile is all her own.

 

 

“Why are you always like this?” She shouts, throwing her arms in the air, and he can see his mother in the tight lines of her mouth, and himself in her clenched fists, and her mother in her blazing eyes. “You’re going to get yourself killed, don’t you care?”

“No?” he snaps back, clenching his hand. “When have I _ever_ cared, Princess?” She looks like she’s going to spit venom in his face. At this point, he would almost appreciate it. “I never wanted to be here in the first place.”

It should bother him, that he’d rather be dead. It should bother him that he wants the anonymity of death.

But he can’t escape that easily. Of course not.

“Maybe you should at least care about the men in your command,” she snarls, jabbing him in the chest. Considering she’s a foot smaller than he is, it’s almost funny. “Because you’re going to get _them_ killed and at least some of them have family that care about them!” 

She storms off, and her words ring in his ears, and when she’s gone he drags his hands down his face and snarls and sighs and murmurs to the empty air where she was,

“I’m sorry.”

 

  

He watches her, sometimes. Just for the sake of it. The putting together of the pieces still haunts him, and he wishes he could forget it, but at the same time, he doesn’t. 

How much of her life did he miss—how much of Luke’s? That they grew up without him, that they’re adults without him, hurts, it _hurts_ , in ways that not even the armour hurt.

He failed them.

He failed Padmé.

 

 

After a disastrous engagement leaves over a hundred dead, she rushes out after the generals all scream each other blue in the face, and he thinks almost nothing of it until a great thunderstorm starts, drenching the ancient building they’re hiding in at the moment. When she still doesn’t come back in, and a pilot presses a blanket into his hand and murmurs “For the princess,” he sighs, and bites the bullet.

He drags his cloak over his head as he steps into the whipping storm, and follows the insistent press of her force sensitivity against his mind around to the leeward side of the temple, where the lashing rain isn’t as bad, although the thunder still booms and the lightning cracks. He finds her huddled in a wedge in the rock and he sighs.

“You’re going to catch cold,” he says, at last, and she jerks, looking up at him. He holds out the waterproof blanket, and after a long moment, she snatches it from him and wraps it tiredly around her shaking shoulders. “Your soldiers are worried about you,” he adds, leaning against the wall of the temple, face turned toward her and out of the rain. “You should go back in.”

“You do it, if you care so much all of a sudden.” She scowls, and the ache in his chest is a physical one—that is a face he recognises more than almost anything else. It was one he had made almost constantly for the first nineteen years of his life. “I want to be alone.”

“Fine,” he says, at last, and settles seated on a ledge above her, his legs keeping the rain out of her face. “I’m not leaving you out here alone, Princess. You’re too important to go rushing off on your own, to sulk.”

“Oh, right,” she snaps. “Like _you’ve_ never done it.”

“I never said I hadn’t,” he replies, and she stills.

She isn’t used to him being so frank with her.

“I used to all the time, when I was younger. And still now, sometimes.” He can feel her watching him, so he continues. “During the Clone Wars, we lost a lot of good men. They were all people, you know. Just like anybody else. They had their own personalities and hopes and dreams, and they fought for everything they gained.

“I was…young. Not that much older than you, and much less mature. It was like a blow every time we lost a man. I always blamed myself. No matter how many times I led them into battle, no matter how many times I put myself to take the blows for them, they still died.”

“So you ran away?” He shrugs a shoulder to her question, leans his chin on his fist. 

“Usually, I would just go stick my head in a speeder for an hour or two, and bite the head off of anybody who came near enough to me. As the war wore on, though, yes. I would run away, and hide. They would send Obi-Wan to get me, sometimes.” Even now, saying Obi-Wan’s name makes his throat clench and his chest feel tight.

Will that wound never heal, in all his life?

“Really?” He looks over at her, and she’s curious now, and he smiles.

“Yes. He could usually talk sense into me better than anyone else could. Unfortunately, we were always…too much alike. I would sulk, and then _he_ would sulk, and then we’d have a row. Then, _nothing_ would get done, because we’d be too busy screaming at each other.” She’s smiling now, not a grin, but it’s there.

“I have to admit, it’s a little bit hard to imagine the great General Ben Kenobi getting into a shouting match with a twenty year old.” He shakes his head, purses his lips, sighs.

“It’s all we ever did. We both…changed. As we got older.” It hurts. It will always hurt. He knows that. “He felt it just as much as I did, in those days. The Clone Wars were…they were.” He clenches his right fist—one of the few pains, the few phantoms, that has never left him, even in all these years. “Nobody came out quite the same.”

It’s quiet between them, for a long time. “So what did they end up doing,” she says, at last, “To get you back? I’ve read the stories. You were a great General.”

“They would send your m—“ the word cuts off in the back of his throat, rams up hard against a steel wall, and he presses his hand to his forehead, takes a few deep breaths. “They would send Padmé. She got through to me, even when nobody else could. Or even wanted to try. We would sit out here, like this,” he gestures to them, to the both of them, “And she would talk to me. About her life.”

It’s quiet again, and she finally murmurs,

“Can you tell me?”

The quiet timidity in her voice, the almost worry that he might rebuff her, become gruff again, tugs on something inside him, and he sighs. Shifts. He would turn more towards her, but it would break the spell, so instead he wraps his hands around one knee.

“She had a happy childhood. She was always ambitious—much like you. She practically beat out her opposition to become Queen, and she did a very good job. She liked it, but she liked being a Senator more. She always fought for what was right.

“She had her own way of sulking, you know.” He pauses, and she’s looking at him, and he sighs.

“It doesn’t seem like her.” 

“She never did it like…like us.” Like father like daughter, he supposes. “More like Luke. Her version of sulking was…thought. And consideration. And action. She never took the hit and stayed down, she just sat there, made a new plan, and got back up.” She makes a quiet noise, and he sighs.

Doesn’t she deserve to know?

“She always missed the makeup,” he says, quietly. “The regnal makeup. White, with red on the upper lip and the centre of the bottom one, and two red dots on her cheekbones. When she was struck by something, she would put it on. It helped her think. To Padmé, part of what made her such a good queen was she was able to step away from herself and into Amidala, and when she was Amidala, she could be stoic. Separate. It helped her be able to make the right decision for everyone, not just for her.

“She did it to me once,” he confides, at last. “I looked stupid—I hadn’t shaved. She laughed and laughed, and her eyes sparkled.” He closes his eyes, glad that it’s still raining, and she can’t see him cry. “It was…”

“You miss her,” she says, quietly, from next to him. “You loved her.”

“I still love her,” he murmurs. “I always will. I just wish I had known then what I know now. I just wish I had been able to…” he chokes off, and finally, “I wish I had been able to help her. And to help…you.”

She doesn’t say anything, for a long moment, and then she reaches out and puts her hand on top of his. It’s one of the first times she’s ever willingly touched him, and he takes her hand, squeezes it back, until she shifts slightly up onto the same level as he is and leans on his shoulder, her eyes closed. Her hair smells like jasmine, and water, and he can smell up close the scent of tears. 

“You did it this time,” she says, quietly, and he wraps his arm around her shoulders, pulls her close.

“I love you too,” he says, his words almost swallowed up in the storm, and he holds her close and tight as she cries into the coarse cloth of his shirt, her face mashed inelegantly into his chest, and he presses his nose into her hair, closes his eyes.

He failed, so many people, so many times. He’ll keep failing people, he knows that. He can’t erase what he’s done, he can only try to repair it.

 

 

He sees so much of himself in her. He sees so much of Padmé in her. But Leia is her own woman, her own strength.

She is utterly her own woman, and it’s belated, and he’s still unsure, but if he can be there for her, make her not be so alone, not so like him— 

That’s enough for him.


End file.
